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City has parking, if you know where to look

Times-News study shows when and where spaces are available downtown

Anita Lockhart, parking enforcement officer with the city of Hendersonville, uses chalk to mark the tires of vehicles parked in a three-hour parking space downtown. After three hours, Lockhart will check to see whether the vehicle is still in the space.

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It's a cry we've heard a lot. It's a cry we believed until we grabbed our notepads and headed off to face the "beast" for ourselves in an informal study that, in the end, reaffirmed the biblical directive "Seek and ye shall find."

"If you're willing to park a ways away, you can park in a minute, but if you want to be right in front of where you want to shop, you may or may not get a spot," said Tara Cantrell of Hendersonville.

Over the period of July 13-19, Times-News reporters counted available spaces along Main Street, Church Street, the avenues between King and Church streets and in public parking lots at four different times throughout the day. Here's what we found:

-- If you're willing to feed a meter or walk a few blocks, you can find a spot. It may not be on Main Street, but spaces on side streets, Church Street and in public parking lots are generally available.

-- The best time to find a parking space on Main Street is when the shops open at 10 a.m. or after 3 p.m., when the lunch crowd has scattered.

-- On nights when events like Rhythm and Brews and Music on Main draw crowds, parking in the blocks between King and Church can be hard to find.

-- Most downtown visitors told Times-News reporters they parked within two or three blocks of their destinations without having to feed parking meters.

"I don't like the idea of meters," said Kelly Ogden, who was having dinner with friends outside of Hannah Flanagan's on a Friday night. "I came downtown with a friend from South Carolina the other day and he didn't have any quarters in his car, so parking was a problem."

Several downtown visitors surveyed throughout the week agreed they would not park in a metered space if they could avoid it.

Cantrell and her husband, Adam, said they "lucked out" on a Main Street space with a three-hour limit within a block of their destination during the lunch rush on July 17. Most shoppers questioned by reporters said three hours was enough time to do what they wanted to do downtown.

Pay to stay

A majority of the spaces on Main Street were limited to two-hour parking for years to encourage turnover and to discourage downtown employees from taking spots from customers.

The City Council raised the time limit to three hours in 2006 after a survey of downtown merchants showed an overwhelming majority favored the idea.

In April, the city added 18 spaces to the Dogwood lot, converting the free ones and a few leased spaces to metered parking in an effort to meet increased demand.

Eva Ritchey, who owns Once Upon a Sign at 305 N. Main St., has asked City Council to look at restoring free parking in the Dogwood lot to make downtown shopping more attractive to customers.

City Main Street Director Lew Holloway said the city has tried that before. During the Christmas holiday season, the city bags meters to allow shoppers to park for free, helping merchants compete with malls and big-box stores that offer free parking.

Holloway said he noticed the free spaces filled up with little turnover, suggesting that downtown workers were taking the spaces rather than shoppers.

Since the elimination of free parking, the Dogwood lot appears to be one of the least-used downtown. Workers have pleaded with the city for more leased spaces, which have been provided.

Feeding the meter for an eight-hour shift would cost $4 in quarters. Feeding it for one 40-hour work week would equal the price of a typical monthly lease — or two parking tickets — $20.

Workers vs. shoppers

Realtor Cindy Bock, whose office is near the Dogwood lot, used to park there when spaces were free. She now juggles where to park every day, racking up tickets for parking more than three hours on the avenues or having an expired meter.

"Washington is the only place you can really park and not have to move your car," she said. "Church is where I usually try to park, but I've had trouble parking on Church lately because now that Dogwood's metered, there's increased competition for spaces on Church. Before 10 in the morning, I can get a space, but after downtown shops open, I find it hard to find a space on Church because of the competition."

The real crux of the parking dilemma may rest with those who live and work downtown.

The city encourages downtown employees to park at least a block from Main Street to free up more spaces for customers, but like shoppers, many workers prefer closer spots, especially when it rains.

City Parking Enforcement Officer Anita Lockhart estimates 70 to 100 spaces would be freed up for visitor parking if business owners and employees would park off of Main Street and the avenues.

"I wish that some of these employers would talk to their employees and say, ‘OK guys, we're going to set up a new policy: nobody's going to park on Main or the side streets,' rain or shine," Lockhart said.

At least one merchant downtown does have that policy and threatens to write up employees who fail to comply.

Holloway said the city has 274 spaces free, unmetered and untimed "on the streets west of Church Street, along Washington and the avenues and also on the avenues east of King Street.

"There are another 700 privately managed spaces in the downtown district, some leased, some still available," he said.

Unloading trouble

But even some merchants who lease spaces still have issues.

"There's no loading zone near my store," which makes business difficult, said Mike Hall, owner of Tempo Music at 244 N. Main St. Hall leases two spots for $60 a month at the Corner Pocket, a closed billiard club, a block from his store, but he has been ticketed several times for expired meters in the Azalea lot.

Hall said he might have to leave his store several times a day and return with equipment such as musical instruments, speakers and TVs that are hard to carry.

"I'll be in the lot and I'll feed the meter for 15 minutes so I can unload, and when I enter the store, sometimes a customer will follow me into the store even though I'm not open yet," he said. Before he realizes it, his meter has expired and he's getting a ticket.

Patty Adamic, owner of Mike's on Main at 303 N. Main St., has a 15-minute loading zone next to her restaurant, but she, too, has received several parking tickets. Adamic leases a space two blocks from the restaurant in the Dogwood parking lot for $20 a month, but that doesn't help when she needs to unload groceries from her car.

"Some business owners know they're going to be in their store for eight hours straight, but I don't," she said.

If she suspects the unloading will take more than 15 minutes or thinks she might be distracted by customers like Hall, she will park in a three-hour spot on Third Avenue. That's where she has gotten most of the nine tickets she's accumulated in the past year.

"I'll park there thinking that I'm going to unload groceries, get a bank deposit together, get some work done, and then I get pulled in all directions with things that come up, like any business. And the next thing you know, three hours have flown by and I have a ticket," she said.

People who live downtown also struggle with tickets.

Jenny Arch lives at Fifth and Main, but her apartment doesn't come with a parking space, so she finds herself jockeying for a spot week after week as she works and runs errands.

"Dogwood is where I used to park," when the spaces were free, she said. "It was my safe place and I could park there all day long and not have to move my car."

Now, she finds herself trying to decide between a $20-a-month reliable leased space in Dogwood, two blocks away from her home, or continuing a daily search for a place to park. The hunt is not working out too well. She has collected eight tickets over the past year.

"I somehow have avoided the repeat offender identity," Arch said, referring to a $100 penalty imposed on parking violators with three or more tickets in a 30-day period. "I guess I come really close, but haven't hit it yet.

"I don't want to pay $20 for a parking space that's two blocks away from where I live. Carrying laundry or groceries home is hard," she said. "I love living in downtown Hendersonville — except for the parking. It's been ridiculous."

Arch has received at least one ticket for violating the city's contiguous parking rule. To promote a turnover of spots, city ordinances prohibit motorists from parking in the same block or adjoining block twice in a day once they surpass the three-hour or 15-minute time limit on a space.

Ritchey said the parking rule isn't posted on any sign and she doubts even residents know it exists until they get a $20 ticket.

"It's unrealistic to expect an out-of-town visitor to read our city's parking ordinances before they park," she said. "It's just another instance when city policies make our town inconvenient and inhospitable."

Seeking answers

Ritchey has led meetings with downtown merchants to brainstorm parking solutions, and the city is hosting a town hall meeting at 5:30 p.m. Aug. 13 to hear the public's concerns, comments and suggestions on downtown parking. The town hall will take place in the City Operations Center on Williams Street.

At the July 11 City Council meeting, Ritchey asked the city to study the feasibility of building parking decks and implementing shuttle service.

The cost of parking structures is hefty. The town of Blowing Rock, which quadruples its nearly 1,500 population each summer with seasonal residents and visitors, created two parking decks for its downtown guests. The first two-level deck, built on a natural slope in 2009, created a net gain of 69 public parking spaces at a cost of more than $1 million.

A second two-level deck, which opened in October 2011, added 58 spaces at a fixed price of $1.3 million, said the city's finance officer, Nicole Newman.

"We're looking for ways to better utilize the resources and infrastructure we currently have," rather than make a huge capital expenditure, Holloway said.

City Manager John Connet said the Dogwood parking lot sees significant traffic during peak times such as lunchtime and dinnertime, but for the most part, the lot is only full about 25 percent of the time.

Spending taxpayer dollars on a parking deck that ends up only partially used "might not be the best use of our resources," he said.

If the city's five downtown parking lots were fully occupied eight hours a day, six days a week, the city would realize revenues of $225,000, he said. Last year, revenues were just over $42,000, indicating that open spaces are more the rule than the exception.

Merchants have asked the city to designate two lots specifically for employees, who would be given free access to spaces with a specialized parking sticker. The city is looking into the possibility.

In another move to free up spaces, city officials agreed in May to ask municipal employees parking along Fifth Avenue East to instead park in the city's Apple parking lot off of Sixth Avenue.

The city has created a new downtown map, already in circulation, and way-finding signs to help guests find the city's parking lots.

To make metered parking more appealing, city officials have been investigating the possibility of modernizing meters so they can be swiped with a credit card or debit card to buy time. A mobile app that would allow visitors to buy more meter time on their cellphones is also being considered.

The new meters might end up costing taxpayers nothing, Holloway said, because the meter company would take a small cut of each time purchase.

City officials also are seeking possible partnerships with property owners who have parking lots and might want to rent or lease open spaces to downtown business owners and their employees.

In a bid to avoid future parking tickets, Adamic contacted Dan Barber, who owns a parking lot half-a-block down from her restaurant behind Hospice Home Store. She will be leasing a space from him for $40 a month.

"With all the tickets I've gotten, if I can figure out how to solve the problem, other downtown business owners and employees can too," Adamic said. "I am trying to find out what other private lots there are downtown to help others find places to park off Main Street and the avenues."

<p>A lack of parking has been one of the biggest monsters facing the city, threatening to scare off shoppers, residents and even merchants while it gobbles up commerce. "Parking is a nightmare downtown!" </p><p>It's a cry we've heard a lot. It's a cry we believed until we grabbed our notepads and headed off to face the "beast" for ourselves in an informal study that, in the end, reaffirmed the biblical directive "Seek and ye shall find."</p><p>"If you're willing to park a ways away, you can park in a minute, but if you want to be right in front of where you want to shop, you may or may not get a spot," said Tara Cantrell of Hendersonville.</p><p>Over the period of July 13-19, Times-News reporters counted available spaces along Main Street, Church Street, the avenues between King and Church streets and in public parking lots at four different times throughout the day. Here's what we found:</p><p>-- If you're willing to feed a meter or walk a few blocks, you can find a spot. It may not be on Main Street, but spaces on side streets, Church Street and in public parking lots are generally available.</p><p>-- The best time to find a parking space on Main Street is when the shops open at 10 a.m. or after 3 p.m., when the lunch crowd has scattered.</p><p>-- On nights when events like Rhythm and Brews and Music on Main draw crowds, parking in the blocks between King and Church can be hard to find.</p><p>-- Most downtown visitors told Times-News reporters they parked within two or three blocks of their destinations without having to feed parking meters.</p><p>"I don't like the idea of meters," said Kelly Ogden, who was having dinner with friends outside of Hannah Flanagan's on a Friday night. "I came downtown with a friend from South Carolina the other day and he didn't have any quarters in his car, so parking was a problem." </p><p>Several downtown visitors surveyed throughout the week agreed they would not park in a metered space if they could avoid it.</p><p>Cantrell and her husband, Adam, said they "lucked out" on a Main Street space with a three-hour limit within a block of their destination during the lunch rush on July 17. Most shoppers questioned by reporters said three hours was enough time to do what they wanted to do downtown.</p><p><b>Pay to stay</b></p><p>A majority of the spaces on Main Street were limited to two-hour parking for years to encourage turnover and to discourage downtown employees from taking spots from customers. </p><p>The City Council raised the time limit to three hours in 2006 after a survey of downtown merchants showed an overwhelming majority favored the idea.</p><p>In April, the city added 18 spaces to the Dogwood lot, converting the free ones and a few leased spaces to metered parking in an effort to meet increased demand. </p><p>Eva Ritchey, who owns Once Upon a Sign at 305 N. Main St., has asked City Council to look at restoring free parking in the Dogwood lot to make downtown shopping more attractive to customers.</p><p>City Main Street Director Lew Holloway said the city has tried that before. During the Christmas holiday season, the city bags meters to allow shoppers to park for free, helping merchants compete with malls and big-box stores that offer free parking.</p><p>Holloway said he noticed the free spaces filled up with little turnover, suggesting that downtown workers were taking the spaces rather than shoppers.</p><p>Since the elimination of free parking, the Dogwood lot appears to be one of the least-used downtown. Workers have pleaded with the city for more leased spaces, which have been provided.</p><p>Feeding the meter for an eight-hour shift would cost $4 in quarters. Feeding it for one 40-hour work week would equal the price of a typical monthly lease — or two parking tickets — $20.</p><p><b>Workers vs. shoppers</b></p><p>Realtor Cindy Bock, whose office is near the Dogwood lot, used to park there when spaces were free. She now juggles where to park every day, racking up tickets for parking more than three hours on the avenues or having an expired meter.</p><p>"Washington is the only place you can really park and not have to move your car," she said. "Church is where I usually try to park, but I've had trouble parking on Church lately because now that Dogwood's metered, there's increased competition for spaces on Church. Before 10 in the morning, I can get a space, but after downtown shops open, I find it hard to find a space on Church because of the competition."</p><p>The real crux of the parking dilemma may rest with those who live and work downtown.</p><p>The city encourages downtown employees to park at least a block from Main Street to free up more spaces for customers, but like shoppers, many workers prefer closer spots, especially when it rains.</p><p>City Parking Enforcement Officer Anita Lockhart estimates 70 to 100 spaces would be freed up for visitor parking if business owners and employees would park off of Main Street and the avenues.</p><p>"I wish that some of these employers would talk to their employees and say, 'OK guys, we're going to set up a new policy: nobody's going to park on Main or the side streets,' rain or shine," Lockhart said.</p><p>At least one merchant downtown does have that policy and threatens to write up employees who fail to comply. </p><p>Holloway said the city has 274 spaces free, unmetered and untimed "on the streets west of Church Street, along Washington and the avenues and also on the avenues east of King Street. </p><p>"There are another 700 privately managed spaces in the downtown district, some leased, some still available," he said.</p><p><b>Unloading trouble</b></p><p>But even some merchants who lease spaces still have issues. </p><p>"There's no loading zone near my store," which makes business difficult, said Mike Hall, owner of Tempo Music at 244 N. Main St. Hall leases two spots for $60 a month at the Corner Pocket, a closed billiard club, a block from his store, but he has been ticketed several times for expired meters in the Azalea lot.</p><p>Hall said he might have to leave his store several times a day and return with equipment such as musical instruments, speakers and TVs that are hard to carry.</p><p>"I'll be in the lot and I'll feed the meter for 15 minutes so I can unload, and when I enter the store, sometimes a customer will follow me into the store even though I'm not open yet," he said. Before he realizes it, his meter has expired and he's getting a ticket.</p><p>Patty Adamic, owner of Mike's on Main at 303 N. Main St., has a 15-minute loading zone next to her restaurant, but she, too, has received several parking tickets. Adamic leases a space two blocks from the restaurant in the Dogwood parking lot for $20 a month, but that doesn't help when she needs to unload groceries from her car.</p><p>"Some business owners know they're going to be in their store for eight hours straight, but I don't," she said. </p><p>If she suspects the unloading will take more than 15 minutes or thinks she might be distracted by customers like Hall, she will park in a three-hour spot on Third Avenue. That's where she has gotten most of the nine tickets she's accumulated in the past year.</p><p>"I'll park there thinking that I'm going to unload groceries, get a bank deposit together, get some work done, and then I get pulled in all directions with things that come up, like any business. And the next thing you know, three hours have flown by and I have a ticket," she said.</p><p>People who live downtown also struggle with tickets.</p><p>Jenny Arch lives at Fifth and Main, but her apartment doesn't come with a parking space, so she finds herself jockeying for a spot week after week as she works and runs errands. </p><p>"Dogwood is where I used to park," when the spaces were free, she said. "It was my safe place and I could park there all day long and not have to move my car."</p><p>Now, she finds herself trying to decide between a $20-a-month reliable leased space in Dogwood, two blocks away from her home, or continuing a daily search for a place to park. The hunt is not working out too well. She has collected eight tickets over the past year.</p><p>"I somehow have avoided the repeat offender identity," Arch said, referring to a $100 penalty imposed on parking violators with three or more tickets in a 30-day period. "I guess I come really close, but haven't hit it yet. </p><p>"I don't want to pay $20 for a parking space that's two blocks away from where I live. Carrying laundry or groceries home is hard," she said. "I love living in downtown Hendersonville — except for the parking. It's been ridiculous."</p><p>Arch has received at least one ticket for violating the city's contiguous parking rule. To promote a turnover of spots, city ordinances prohibit motorists from parking in the same block or adjoining block twice in a day once they surpass the three-hour or 15-minute time limit on a space.</p><p>Ritchey said the parking rule isn't posted on any sign and she doubts even residents know it exists until they get a $20 ticket.</p><p>"It's unrealistic to expect an out-of-town visitor to read our city's parking ordinances before they park," she said. "It's just another instance when city policies make our town inconvenient and inhospitable."</p><p><b>Seeking answers</b></p><p>Ritchey has led meetings with downtown merchants to brainstorm parking solutions, and the city is hosting a town hall meeting at 5:30 p.m. Aug. 13 to hear the public's concerns, comments and suggestions on downtown parking. The town hall will take place in the City Operations Center on Williams Street.</p><p>At the July 11 City Council meeting, Ritchey asked the city to study the feasibility of building parking decks and implementing shuttle service. </p><p>The cost of parking structures is hefty. The town of Blowing Rock, which quadruples its nearly 1,500 population each summer with seasonal residents and visitors, created two parking decks for its downtown guests. The first two-level deck, built on a natural slope in 2009, created a net gain of 69 public parking spaces at a cost of more than $1 million. </p><p>A second two-level deck, which opened in October 2011, added 58 spaces at a fixed price of $1.3 million, said the city's finance officer, Nicole Newman.</p><p>"We're looking for ways to better utilize the resources and infrastructure we currently have," rather than make a huge capital expenditure, Holloway said.</p><p>City Manager John Connet said the Dogwood parking lot sees significant traffic during peak times such as lunchtime and dinnertime, but for the most part, the lot is only full about 25 percent of the time.</p><p>Spending taxpayer dollars on a parking deck that ends up only partially used "might not be the best use of our resources," he said. </p><p>If the city's five downtown parking lots were fully occupied eight hours a day, six days a week, the city would realize revenues of $225,000, he said. Last year, revenues were just over $42,000, indicating that open spaces are more the rule than the exception.</p><p>Merchants have asked the city to designate two lots specifically for employees, who would be given free access to spaces with a specialized parking sticker. The city is looking into the possibility.</p><p>In another move to free up spaces, city officials agreed in May to ask municipal employees parking along Fifth Avenue East to instead park in the city's Apple parking lot off of Sixth Avenue. </p><p>The city has created a new downtown map, already in circulation, and way-finding signs to help guests find the city's parking lots. </p><p>To make metered parking more appealing, city officials have been investigating the possibility of modernizing meters so they can be swiped with a credit card or debit card to buy time. A mobile app that would allow visitors to buy more meter time on their cellphones is also being considered. </p><p>The new meters might end up costing taxpayers nothing, Holloway said, because the meter company would take a small cut of each time purchase.</p><p>City officials also are seeking possible partnerships with property owners who have parking lots and might want to rent or lease open spaces to downtown business owners and their employees.</p><p>In a bid to avoid future parking tickets, Adamic contacted Dan Barber, who owns a parking lot half-a-block down from her restaurant behind Hospice Home Store. She will be leasing a space from him for $40 a month.</p><p>"With all the tickets I've gotten, if I can figure out how to solve the problem, other downtown business owners and employees can too," Adamic said. "I am trying to find out what other private lots there are downtown to help others find places to park off Main Street and the avenues."</p>